Core Concepts

Let’s assume you’re familiar with core Git, Docker, Kubernetes, Continuous Delivery, and GitOps concepts. Below are some of the concepts that are specific to Argo CD.

• Application A group of Kubernetes resources as defined by a manifest. This is a Custom Resource Definition (CRD).
• Application source type Which Tool is used to build the application.
• Target state The desired state of an application, as represented by files in a Git repository.
• Live state The live state of that application. What pods etc are deployed.
• Sync status Whether or not the live state matches the target state. Is the deployed application the same as Git says it should be?
• Sync The process of making an application move to its target state. E.g. by applying changes to a Kubernetes cluster.
• Sync operation status Whether or not a sync succeeded.
• Refresh Compare the latest code in Git with the live state. Figure out what is different.
• Health The health of the application, is it running correctly? Can it serve requests?
• Tool A tool to create manifests from a directory of files. E.g. Kustomize. See Application Source Type.
• Configuration management tool See Tool.
• Configuration management plugin A custom tool.